s. Tall, stout, fresh, pleasant growth of the open air and the
hills, as she was, she never dreamed of despising the little skipping
tailor of Rapps, though he was shorter by the head than herself. She had
heard his music, and evidently had danced after it. The fiddler and
fiddle together filled up her ambition. But the old people!--they were
in perfect hysterics of wrath and indignation. Their daughter!--with the
exception of one brother, now absent on a visit to his uncle in Hungary,
a great gold-miner in the Carpathian mountains, the sole remnant of an
old, substantial house, which had fed their flocks and their herds on
the hills for three generations, and now drew wealth from the heart of
these hills themselves! It was death! poison! pestilence! The girl must
be mad; the hop-o'-my-thumb scoundrel must carry witch-powder!

Nevertheless, as Hans and the damsel were agreed, every thing
else--threats, denunciations, sarcasms, cuttings-off with a shilling,
and loss of a ponderous dowry--all went for nothing. They were married,
as some thousands were before them in just the like circumstances. But
if the Bohemian maid was not mad, it must be confessed that Hans was
rather so. He was monstrously exasperated at the contempt heaped by the
heavy bergman on the future Buergermeister of Rapps, and determined to
show a little spirit. As his fiddle entered into all his schemes, he
resolved to have music at his wedding; and no sooner did he and his
bride issue from the church, than out broke the harmony which he had
provided. The fiddle played merrily, "You'll repent, repent, repent;
you'll repent, repent, repent;" and the bassoon answered, in surly
tones, "And soon! and soon!" "I hope, my dear," said the bride, "You
don't mean the words for us." "No, love," explained Hans, gallantly; "I
don't say 'we,' but 'you'--that is, certain haughty people on these
hills that shall be nameless." Then the music played till they reached
the inn where they dined, and then set off in a handsome hired carriage
for Rapps.

It is true, that there was little happiness in this affair to any one.
The old people were full of anger, curses, and threats of total
disownment. Hans's pride was pricked, and perforated, till he was as
sore as if he had been tattooed with his own needle; and his wife was
completely drowned in sorrow at such a parting with her parents, and
with no little sense of remorse for her disobedience. Nevertheless, they
reached home;